Netrunner: Ending the Spin

Yesterday, I posted an article explaining my opinions on all of the cards of the Genesis Cycle that will be cycling out and man oh man, did people lose their minds. First of all I’d like to say a huge thank you to all the people that took the time to check it out and an even bigger thank you to all the people that gave me feedback on it or were willing to have a conversation on various opinions I wrote down in the article. It’s always amazing to see how much my readers care about the stuff I write and seeing the numbers the article hit last time, I am beyond amazed and overwhelmed. I’ll keep writing stuff like that non-stop if you guys and gals like it so much. Reminder that this is a non-commercial website, so I don’t really gain anything from views and stuff. Me and my team launched this because we love writing about indie games and other stuff.

In case you missed the previous article, you should definitely check it out.

So to get to the article’s point, today we will be going through the cards of the Spin Cycle that will be rotating out (along with Genesis) when the 8th cycle starts. That is the one after the one after Flashpoint. The official FFG post for reference can be found here. Special thanks to Paul Wulff and Adrian Ber on the Netrunner Geeks facebook group for helping me with pinpointing when the exact rotation will happen. To put it into an image for better understanding, here you go:

So let’s get to it, starting with the identities found within the data packs first again!

Identities

Corp

GRNDL: Not too many people still play this ID since having a bad pub from the start of the game can really help the runner a lot in the current meta. Other than that, despite its amazing startup bonus of having 10 credits, the deck doesn’t hold all too well in the mid/late game because of its lack of a powerful ability to make even more credits. Surely you can play Restructures from the start of the game, meaning that having any sorts of powerful operation economy can give you an even better start, but the current meta-game is very punishing and can have GRNDL funneling money to the runner through Siphons or other means in no time. The cycling out of GRNDL won’t be missed too much since we rarely ever see this ID played anymore.

Runner

Reina Roja: The Red Queen may not be the most played Anarch identity but still packs a very formidable ability that can hurt any unprepared corp player. We saw tons upon tons of pressure and locks decks with Reina as the primary identity and even now, we still see some bold players running with her. I personally find her to be an amazing identity, both because of her 1 link and amazing ability as well as because of her awesome theme. Few runners have such an amazing background theme. She is a very big deal in the Android world after all. We might not see her much, but the Red Queen will be sorely missed. All those fun Caissa decks will vanish and the Reina – Rook – Xanadu combos will no longer be around to annoy us.

Let’s move to all the other cards now that were in the set. We’ll start with the Very Important ones again.

Very Important

Only one of the above cards is in this list, guess which one…

NEXT Bronze: This is a big hit for all the NEXT decks. They might just be sort of unplayable after the cycling out of the Bronze piece since the Barrier (together with a Mother Goddess maybe) will be the only reasonably good NEXT piece of ice. The Sentry one never really saw much use. I mean, surely you’ve had a Batty in a server with it and it won you games from time to time, but the early game potential of the NEXT ICE will just be entirely gone due to the lower amount of it in your deck.

Blue Level Clearance: Great economy and draw card. Just like with Green Level Clearance (which is also cycling out), this was used extensively by both HB and Weyland (core ID) decks. Even TWIY* decks made big use of it due to the speed it provided. It may be a double click operation, but certainly one of the most reliable ones int he game.

Clone Retirement: This will hurt all those Jinteki fast advance decks that are out there and really needed to score that last 1 point in a clutch situation. I’ve personally ran this in PE, RP and now Nisei with great success. Playing 5/3s and a couple of these was always awesome for a game finisher. Most did not even expect it. It will be missed for sure.

Shock!: Oh man. Why do you have to go and cycle out Shock!? I mean sure, you are hurting IG decks that way, since they won’t be able to protect Archives all that well anymore, but at the same time, it was the most reliable net damage asset in Jinteki. You do not have to pay anything for it, it costs 2 to trash and it works from anywhere the Runner gets to see it. I will most definitely miss Shock a lot.

Sundew: Although we haven’t seent his in a while (due to RP not being a usual choice anymore), I have to say that I personally believe that it is one of the best assets in the game. I used it extensively in my early Nisei Division builds and it worked just great. If you have lots of money anyway, you are basically inviting the runner to run your remote and trash it for 2. That also activates cards that say “Only if the runner has made a successful run in his/her last turn.” Guess which yellow card says that.

Yagura: One of the best and most reliable Code Gate ICE that Jinteki has. Only 1 to rez and with two subroutines, it was a great way to protect R&D that got used a lot since it came out. It may not be used as much now, but this piece of ICE is definitely one of the most played ones in Jinteki. It will most definitely be missed, probably most by PE players.

Celebrity Gift: This is a HUGE hit for Jinteki decks. The red corp faction always had issues with its economy, so when Celebrity Gift came out, everyone rejoiced and basically said “Now the red finally have money to do stuff!” Although there are many other ways to have good economy now (Palana being one of them even as an ID), Jinteki will most definitely miss this card. For example, showing a Fetal AI, a Snare and a normal agenda was just great. It was not just about the economy, but also about the information that you were revealing to the runner. This card was also used due to its fast economy gain by CI players. It will be missed by all Jinteki players for sure.

Caprice Nisei: The card that people will miss the most. Well that one and the one below it. Caprice provided a certain kind of protection that other upgrades couldn’t. Forcing the runner to run again if they failed the psi game and never getting trashed in the process, is simply the most punishing thing the game has ever seen. I mean, sure you may has Ash or Batty or whatever else to protect your server from getting accessed, but those have an expiry date. Caprice does not. I will personally miss her a lot, since it has become one of my all-time favourite cards. It is just great to see the runner become dissappointed after having run Caprice servers in Nisei Division unsuccessfully more than 10 times. This will also hurt the Redcoats HB decks that relied on her a lot sometimes in order to score out.

Jackson Howard: Unlike Caprice which is included in certain decks here and there, Jackson has always been somewhat a “must include” in every corp deck. It is as if Jackson is the soul of your corp deck. If you don’t have him, your deck has no soul (yes I had to explain that). With Jackson’s leave, not only do corps get a huge decrease in drawing speed (because, let’s face it, there is no better drawing mechanic in the game, especially at that rez/play cost), but they will also lose the shuffle ability. Yellow will still have Sensie Actors Union in order to shuffle agendas from HQ into R&D and there is of course the Museum of History for shuffling stuff back from Archives. But there is no other card with a trash ability that says “shuffle cards from archives” unfortunately. Even Allele Suppression says “swap cards from HQ with cards from Archives” on trash, which could lead to the runner coming to your hand. Yes, that does create other fancy plays, but it’s still not the classic Jackson stuff where you just draw up in order to shuffle the too many agendas, that are burning holes in your hand, back into R&D. Lily Lockwell might also see some more play due to her “Rez – Draw 3” ability. Jackson Howard, or Jesus as many liked to call him, will be missed, A LOT.

Wraparound: The anti-faust ICE is going away. But Faust is staying. You would say “Whatever man, Faust is on the MWL now” but from what I see it is still played as much as it was ever played. Same for Wyldside. They are just amazing cards and even though you can’t have all the shenanigans that accompany them in order to make your life easier (talking about influence spent on other cards), you are still breaking through easy. I am pretty sure someone from Reddit will read this again and say “man, this guy is being salty again”. Well, that’s just like your opinion man. If you don’t like mine, stop reading this. Going back to Wraparound though, it is definitely not there just for stopping Faust. Even though one would say that Vanilla is good a gear check (if they have a fracter or not), Wraparound still does that job better, because it is generally an AI stopper. It doesn’t stop just Faust, but all other AI programs that dare try to break through your servers. At its cost, Wraparound is a very reliable piece of barrier ICE and that is the reason why it was slotted to many other non-NBN decks too. It will most definitely make a difference once it’s gone.

Sweeps Week: One of the most reliable economy operations that NBN has. This card was also the bane of Andromeda in the 1st turn. Giving the Corp 8 credits with 1 click is most definitely what you want as a runner. Sweeps Week basically works as a second Hedge Fund for most decks and it is one of the best ways to recover from big hits such as Siphon or Vamp. Its rotation will most definitely be felt by NBN decks.

Shipment from SanSan: In case you don’t have money, just use shipment from SanSan. For a very long time, people would use this in order to be able to score out their agendas without money. There are many games that were finished with Install – Shipment – AstroCounter – Score. We saw the use of this in HB decks with Efficiency Committee and even more now again with the Jeeves Model Bioroids asset that allows corp players to get an extra click by playing Subliminal Messaging with SFSS. This card will be not missed as much as the other yellow cards that are cycling out, but it will most definitely create a gap that other cards at the moment can’t fill.

Geothermal Fracking: One of Weyland’s most important agendas. Before we got Oaktown Renovation, Geothermal Fracking was da bomb. It basically allowed Weyland players to get that huge money advantage that they need in order to Sea Source – Scorch – Scorch faster, and all that in exchange of just a few counter of bad publicity. Definitely one of the agendas that allowed Weyland to shine early on. It won’t be missed as much as it would have been if it rotated back then, but it’s surely a great loss for the faction.

The Cleaners: Also another really good Weyland agenda. This will most definitely be felt when it rotates out because the cards that are coming out for Weyland at the moment, are very hostile-oriented. Having The Cleaners in your deck is not only good because of its effect, but also because it is a 5/3, meaning your deck’s agenda density becomes lower. This was the agenda of choice for many Weyland players and even though it wasn’t scored that often, it was definitely scary to see in the deck.

Elizabeth Mills: This girl used to not be played all that much. Not until Wyldside became a card that you would see in at least half of your match-ups in any premier event. Besides that, Elizabeth Mills manages to deal with all Location cards that your opponent may be using. That could be a hotel for Criminals, a Bazaar or a Personal Workshop for Shapers, or an Aesop’s Pawnshop for Noise. She is definitely a good card to have around due to her low cost and easy-to-use-whenever location-sniping ability. She will be missed by mostly Weyland players.

Hive: The must-have ICE of Cerebral Imaging combo decks. Other than that, it was one of the most solid and hard to get-by pieces of ICE that you could include in any faction’s deck. Hive basically gave amazing protection to all those decks that just need a little bit of extra time before they are set up and ready to go. It will be missed by combo decks and by Weyland even more.

Curtain Wall: The best ICE Blue Sun has and one of the biggest and most reliable stoppers for Weyland in general. Not only could you just Oversight AI this and sit back and score out, but this also provided an amazingly huge gear check in general. It needs both a decent fracter as well as a lot of money to get through it. The rise of Blue Sun was the reason why I stopped playing Morning Star back then actually.

Power Shutdown: I believe the reason why this card does not see much play lately, is because DLR is a thing and you do not really want to be trashing your own damn cards when the Runner is doing the exact same thing. If anything, it is a dead card if you are facing DLR. Other than that, this is a really good card and it cut down a lot of Runner decks. It delayed Stealth builds, it broke Clone Chips and after Clone Chip getting on the MWL, it became even more important and dreadful. I remember those awesome PE decks that ran this and scared the shit out of everyone.

Punitive Counterstrike: This has not been played in ages. It is still a very good card though and a very good way to kill people when they least expect it. Runners make a lot of money fast lately so Punitive became a bit obsolete. Corps just can’t afford to Punivite anymore, especially early game. It also didn’t see much play because Global Food Initiative was played a lot and it did not synergize until lately when the card was errata’d. Great meat damage card that a lot of decks will miss.

NAPD Contract: One of the best agendas in the game. NBN decks used it extensively just for the fact that it slowed down runners. RP decks were the most annoying ones though since most of the agendas in the decks would be really hard to steal ones (NAPD, Nisei MK II , The Future Perfect). This stopped seeing that much play once it was put on the MWL list. Well, it still sees a bit of play, but certainly not in sets of 3. Global Food Initiative is the go-to choice yet again when spending influence for including an agenda and for a 4/2, the Corporate Sales Team is also good to have. It is a huge pity that it is cycling out, since I love the art on the promo card.

Quandary: The little version of Enigma. This is basically the cheapest gear check Code Gate ICE in the game. Ran extensively by TWIY* decks back in the day and now providing a cheap answer for ending the run. It will most definitely be missed since there are not many other cheap choices to take each place at the moment.

Grim: This used to be in many decks, but we do not see it anymore, just because people prefer Assassin or something else instead. However, Grim, despite its backdraw of giving 1 bad publicity, is a very good Trash Program ICE since it has very high strength. I believe that the rise of Faust is what made Grim also go out of decks, plus people prefer things like Ichi because of the many subroutines. I do not have much experience playing it, but I have much experience facing it, and I can tell you that it was for sure a very hard piece of Sentry ICE to get by.

Subliminal Messaging: This is not a great card. I’ll say it now before you start thinking “why is this here?” The reason why it is here is because it is a decent card and even more because it allowed for the lately famous Jeeves combos. Those are the only reasons. I don’t think it will be missed much.

Interns: This is the neutral Archived Memories. Sure, it does not work with operations, but at the same time, it makes up for its lack of synergy with operations by allowing the installation of ICE without paying extra costs. Interns has always been useful against all sorts of runner builds, especially the dumblefork ones or generally the ones that ran parasite recursion. It is a card that is still used by quite a few decks, so it will be surely missed.

Restructure: One of the best economy cards in the game and also a neutral one, meaning it went everywhere, just like Hedge Fund. Even though you can’t play it unless you are at 10 credits, a lot of decks treated it like Hedge Fund in most cases. This will create a huge gap for all those decks that play with operation economy. The fall of Whizzard might allow for asset economy to rise but at the same time, there might still be problems around.

Knight: I loved the Caissa programs so so much. Knight was the one that saw the most play though because of its high strength and ability to break through pretty much anything. It does cost a lot both in clicks and credits to use, but it was a reliable answer to a lot of things. Sometimes you had to go the extra way in order to get into a server and Knight made sure you had a good answer to almost everything. This card doesn’t see much play at the moment so I don’t think that people will notice its removal that much.

Keyhole: Oh my god yes. Ok, I am from the school of thought that says Keyhole is an amazingly good card but also very well priced for what it does, but at the same time, I believe that it does something that may just be way too powerful for the current meta-game. You’d come out and say “yo Kelf, git gud and learn to play against it.” Well, dear reader, I know how to play against it and it is not once or twice that I’ve beat such a deck during a premier tournament. However, all I am saying is that may just be a little bit too much in combination with what else runners have at the moment. This, along with DLR and Whizzard, is a huge hit for Anarchs since most of their pressuring mechanics are straight up gone.

Hostage: The only tutor event in the game that allows you to look up resources. Hostage was very often played in criminal and shaper decks in order to get that Kati, Mr.Li, Professional Contacts or whatever else out fast enough to get your rig running. We don’t see it very much in play lately, since people probably think that relying on a resource is just too slow at the moment. We also don’t see it because most runner decks are just too thirsty for influence thus not leaving any for tutors.

Copycat: I’ve won far more games than I should have with this. This is the reason why I included it here, plus the fact that I had to troll you a little bit.

Fall Guy: This is a great resource that just ended up being used mostly by DLR anarch decks. It is still a great resource that Geist will miss a lot, due to the huge credit gain that it gets him when paired with Tech Trader. Generally, a good card that allowed for all sorts of nice combos that would have the corp spending money and time to break through trashing important resources.

Lucky Find: This does not see that much play anymore and it was also the card that brought into the light Prepaid Voice Pad. Its too influence is far too restricting at the moment to be included anywhere. It still sees a bit of use, but only in decks that really rely on event economy for money.

Blackmail: The basic piece of Valencia’s builds. You could build any kind of deck with that ID, but not putting at least one or two Blackmails in there would just be heresy. This card also gave a regionals win to the most obscure Silhouette build I’ve ever seen, running Corporate Scandal and Blackmail in order to get into servers. I am pretty sure noone will miss this. It was a pretty annoying card.

Prepaid VoicePAD: I will say once again that when I played this card, noone even knew about it. Although, my deck build was not as successful or good for competitive play as Calimsha’s was (at least I believe that is the person who brought it into the competitive light). This deck, paired with all sorts of events allowed for fast economic advantage over the corp and also allowed for consistent pressure through various events that would otherwise set you back a bit. This won’t be missed that much since people stopped playing it after it was placed in the MWL.

John Masanori: This guy pairs perfectly with Security Testing. It also one of those cards that are perfectly designed with both its plus and minus. John Masanori is the mascot of many Netrunner communities and he will be missed a lot since a lot of decks relied on running a lot in order to keep the draw coming.

Important

Fenris: Stopped seeing play as soon as sentries became way easier to break. People used to face-check this all the time and get hit hard early-game. This no longer happens. That does not mean though that Fenris is not still a good piece of ICE. Solid brain damage and end the run subroutines on it.

Wotan: The biggest and baddest bioroid on the block. It’s a real pity this is going away. Still an amazing piece of ICE. If you have the money to rez it, it will most definitely keep people out.

Reclamation Order: Archived Memories’ big brother. Mostly used in CI builds. Still amazing to have in other decks if you want to pull back a lot of a certain card. Won’t be missed that much in my opinion.

Accelerated Diagnostics: The number one combo card. This together with Jackson basically ran all of the fancy operation combos. It never saw play other than in those weird combo decks though so we won’t feel its leave that much.

Strongbox: Pretty great card that rarely ever saw play. That could either be because of its cost or because of the fact that it is so easy to trash if the runner sees it anywhere.

Tsurugi: Great RP-times piece of Sentry ICE. Even though I’m a huge Jinteki fan, I never liked Tsurugi. Too many credits for low Strength despite its many subroutines. This rarely ever sees play anymore. People prefer to play other stuff that are just easier to rez and that have more effective effects. It did allow Dan D’argenio to finish off Minh though during the grand finals at worlds 2014. I don’t think many people will miss this.

Himitsu-Bako: Solid 2 rez – 2 strength end the run barrier for Jinteki with an effect that allowed it to be moved elsewhere without too much effort or money. We don’t see it that much but it is definitely a decent piece of ICE that Jinteki needed due to its lack of End The Run ICE.

TGTBT: Amazing little agenda that saw a lot of play with all those Butcher Shops and whatnot. It was also part of the Harpsichord decks that ran a lot of 1-agenda point cards. Not used that much now, so won’t be missed.

RSVP: Unlike most yellow cards that I do not like the least bit, this lil piece of Code Gate ICE is just really, really good. For 3 credits on rez and a strength of 4, it was always annoying to have an RSVP rezzed somewhere on the board. As I already mentioned many times, things are easier to break now, but this is still annoying being a Code Gate. RSVP saw a lot of play back in the times of NAPD Contract and it got included in a lot of non-NBN decks too. It may not see much play but it’s still quite an interesting piece of ICE that it was good to have around.

Snoop: My personal favourite yellow card. Snoop was my answer to I’ve Had Worse. 6 for 6 and an ability that gives you tons of information on encounter was hard to miss out on. I included at least one of this in pretty much most of my PE decks. I am very sad to see this go now even though I am pretty sure that everyone else won’t even bat an eye with its leave.

GRNDL Refinery: Great economy asset for Weyland. Also great for faking agendas since you could just keep advancing it and pop it on your turn when you felt you’ve advanced it enough. Not many Weyland decks still play this, but it was a good asset to have.

Profiteering: This was mostly played by those decks that played with a lot of 1-agenda point cards like PE and Harpsichord. It is actually a really good agenda for those decks that don’t care how much bad publicity they have. All they care about is how much money they got. It is somewhat an important gap for the 1 point agenda suites.

Paper Wall: This card used to be very important due to its low cost and gear check utility. Vanilla pretty much replaced it now since it is so much better.

Cyberdex Trial: I always thought this might be a big deal. Apparently it was played for a while by a few players that needed to have something in hand (other than just a Cyberdex Virus Suite) in order to get rid of all of those pesky virus counters. Noone will miss this.

Quest Completed: Really fun card. Rarely ever saw play but it sure was effective when it did work. Won’t be missed much since it was just an extra addition to most decks. The decks that ran only centrals were rarely fast enough in order to be able to win consistently.

Queen’s Gambit: This is a pretty good card. Anarchs really need economy cards and Queen’s Gambit really helped with that. The only backdraw of it is that it’s a double event but at the same time, it just makes the runner 6 easy credits. Unless of course you ended up putting the advancement on an agenda or something else that the Corp could use. This will most definitely be missed.

Rook: The other most used Caissa piece. Rook was a must-include piece for all those Reina lock decks. Rook was powerful, mostly because its effect was for all the ICE on a server, making it really, really annoying. It doesn’t see much play anymore so I doubt that it will be missed.

Scheherazade: This was yet another way for Anarchs to save a few bucks here and there. Noise used it a lot since he kept selling stuff to Aesop’s anyway. Scheherazade saw some fancy synergies with Pawn and Deep Red but at the same time, it really didn’t see use in many other decks.

Silencer: This was essential for running Switchblade. I personally find it a bit too much that it is 3 influence to included anywhere else, but maybe FFG knows better than I do. This will be missed for all of those people that run stealth builds, even though stealth builds are too slow for the current meta-game (at least that is my opinion after having played it for the past year or so up to now).

Garrote: The most effective killer in the game.

LLDS Processor: Best combo piece for Chameleon. Other than that, didn’t do much else. Will only be missed by the Chameleon Shapers.

CyberSolutions Mem Chip: This may not have been used enough but it was just great to know that you can have a non-console piece of hardware that gives you so much MU space. It won’t be missed all that much but it was good to have as an option when deckbuildilng.

Sharpshooter: I was thinking if I should include this in the very important cards but I ended up thinking that not too many play this at the moment. Maybe because the only shapers that are left are the Panchatantra ones. It will most definitely be missed though since it was always a great solution for breaking those pesky Destroyers.

Torch: The best Code Gate breaker in the game (unless you have Yog.0 on Dinosaurus). You of course only installed it by Test Running it and then Scavenging it, just like with Garrote (classic Chaos Theory plays). It will be missed since there will only be low strength decoders left now.

“Oh my god, that card exists?”/ Not That Important

Project Ares: Not a great agenda. The overadvancement was always hard to pull off. Barely ever saw play.

Rex Campaign: It’s like the other campaigns! Only bad.

Isabel McGuire: Unless you are Lynx Jaime Kuroneko you are not going to miss this at all.

Hudson 1.0: I tried to make this work, turns out it’s more bad than it seems to be. You don’t want to have too much utility. Why not just have an effective end the run in its place?

Gyri Labyrinth: This was so good in those small brain damage decks (Cybernetics Division). It was put to good use in PE decks too, but it’s still an easy to break Code Gate, so the careful runner rarely ever fell for it.

Hellion Alpha Test: This never saw play. At least I never saw it.

Panic Button: Same with this one. You would think that it would have some kind of use in some decks (like CI for example) but it really never had much use.

Unorthodox Predictions: I saw a couple decks with this, but it required very careful planning, very specific order of cards coming to your hand and a lot more in order to work perfectly. If it did, the runner would not be able to do anything, but that was very, very rare.

Toshiyuki Sakai: When this guy came out, there were quite a few people that said he might be great for those PE ambush decks. Then we all came to the realization that he was just wasted card space. I mean, why not just install the thing you wanted from the start? (I do get it, there are awesome plays that you can create with this guy, but that is just all “if” scenarios).

Marker: It just ain’t that good. If it was something like 7-8 strength, then sure.

Shinobi: I only ever saw this in Making News decks and even then it was quite the surprise. Ff0x beat someone with it in the top 8 cut of the Dutch Nationals in 2014.

Character Assassination: This used to be played so much before NAPD and Explode-A-Palooza.

Market Research: This too. The NBN decks that also managed to tag people played this instead of Character Assassination.

Broadcast Square: A bit too overkill. I mean, if you are going to take bad publicity, just deal with it man.

City Surveillance: This was used quite a bit lately, by those asset-spam Controlling the Message decks. Still not great though due to its high cost. Only reason to play it is if you have lots of money and you want to tax the runner lots as well through both tags and trash-cost.

Muckraker: This is a great piece of ICE for the people that play Making News. Pretty well designed and hard to get by as a runner, this saw a bit of play in the past. Not anymore though.

Invasion of Privacy: I tried to make this viable in a Weyland deck. It did not work, at all. Really fun to play card, but it just costs too much time and money.

Corporate Shuffle: Some NBN decks actually played this. At least one or two in the deck just in case you need a fast shuffle to keep yourself going. Jackson was not the fastest thing you could use in small decks like TWIY* (yes, anonymous tip plus this is faster).

Vulcan Coverup: You’d think this is a really good agenda, but it’s not. Weyland is dripping agendas all over the place, you can’t risk having more negative effects when those are stolen.

Swarm: This is a really cool card. Costs a lot of credits to get it working, but if it works, it works really nicely. It really does a lot of work if it fires.

Ireress: I never understood the point of this. Let’s pay money to put an ICE in front of one of our servers, so that when they run there they don’t have bad pub. What if you don’t have that much bad pub? How is this any good in any way?

Witness Tampering: Bad card, nice art.

Off the Grid: I loved seeing people that made this work. Tim, one of the Rotterdam community players made an awesome deck with this and a bunch of other cool stuff. Still a card that didn’t see much play other than in those funky and fun decks.

Veterans Program: Just a general 1-point agenda that helped fill up those decks that ran a lot of those. Won’t be missed when gone. Others will replace it.

Singularity: The easy way of getting rid of everything in a server. Well, not THAT easy, but still good way to be sure everything is gone.

Deep Red: The theme of all the Caissa programs along with this and generally Reina’s personality was just amazing. I’m really sad to see this, and all of the combos it enabled, go.

Hemorrhage: Do not be mistaken by the fact that this is in this category. This was a card that saw quite a bit of play through Noise. It was really annoying to deal with since it meant that if you had open servers, the runner could just empty your hand in no time. Doesn’t see play any more though.

Pawn: Pawn was just super fun to play with. Just moving all the chess pieces across the board all the time. Making a successful run and just moving forward getting credits through installing another pawn through scheharazade and moving it in again through Deep Red’s ability. It felt like having a Desperado but with more options because at any given time you could just bring another Caissa program from your heap or grip into play at no cost.

Bishop: Bishop was probably the worst of the Caissa programs. It helped Parasite kill stuff faster, Mimic break through high strength Sentries and quite a few other things. Still a program that took MU space though and it also valuable deck space.

Activist Support: This is still used by a few people that play DLR decks in order to protect themselves from The All-Seeing-I (giving bad publicity to the corp means you can remove it when they play that in order to avoid it). Never saw play in other cases though.

Tallie Perrault: I saw this played once and the guy that played it said “I’m removing it from my deck, she doesn’t really do all that much..”

Hard at Work: Talking about bad cards.

Leverage: And even worse cards.

Lawyer Up: This was played a lot back in the day. I used to see a lot of Siphon into Lawyer Up. It’s because Criminals didn’t have other ways to draw up so they played this. It is super effective if it comes after a siphon actually. I’m not quite sure why people don’t play this anymore. Maybe because deck space is tighter for Criminals now and there are more important things to include. Still not gonna be missed though.

Executive Wiretaps: Nope.

Running Interference: This could have been great, but it ended up not being played at all. I think I saw it like once or twice since it came out.

Recon: Also unplayed.

Blackguard: Great card effect, but maybe priced a bit too high. On the other hand, that is just my opinion and the card may be priced perfectly fine for what it does. I mean, if you combo it with a couple other things that expose and are super cheap (expose effect cards are generally cheap) you got yourself a really powerful combination. I tried to make it work quite a few times but always ended up dissappointed at it. I really don’t want to see this go, but maybe it’s for the best. Gotta set free what you love sometimes right?

Savoir-faire: Rarely ever played.

Gorman Drip v1: This is actually a pretty great card that was used by Noise a lot. Hasn’t seen a lot of play ever since the first MWL though and it kinda makes sense.

Expert Schedule Analyzer: I also tried to make this work but the thing with Criminals is that they are always kept out of HQ, so you need the MU for things that will help you get in there. You can’t afford to have extra little things that will do fancy stuff but will take MU instead.

Leviathan: This is finally cycling out? For real? Finally!

Grifter: This also saw play quite a few times, but it was not that viable.

Power Nap: This barely ever saw play. Only in those fancy decks that played a lot of double events.

Eureka!: People tried to make this work with motivation, meaning they could see something big coming and then play this in order to install for cheap. Just like with all other combo decks that need certain cards before they start working, those decks did not work and this did not see any play.

Capstone: This was not played at all. Kinda makes sense. Maybe if it was 0 cost it would have seen a little bit of play.

Lockpick: This basically helped in case you wanted to activate your Refractor faster instead of having to wait for your Cloaks or your Ghost Runners. Won’t be missed all that much since it took a long time to set up all of that in order to start running. Thus, it did not see much use.

Record Reconstructor: I always tried to find a good reason to include this in the deck, but then I realized that there are few Corp Decks that have cards that they don’t like. Plus, the only purpose it could serve would be to stall the corp so that you can set up more.

Paintbrush: Great concept and mechanic, costs too much time and money. It also takes up too much space.

Alpha: This together with Omega seemed great but their extravagant costs didn’t allow them to shine all that much. There was a pretty ok-ish Rielle “Kit” deck that made use of these in order to be annoying all around the place.

False Echo: Other than in those Valencia decks that forced you to rez and then had you getting your ICE back in hand, this program didn’t see much play. It won’t be missed since it was a very specific combo piece.

Omega: Same story as Alpha.

Woman in the Red Dress: I have seen this way many more times than I should have. Every time, my opponent would say something like “I have a plan for it!” Then in the end of the game they would say something like “ok, this is most definitely going out of the deck…”

Motivation: Great little card. I loved the theme of it and despite its awesome synergy with Oracle May, it was just an overall good card to have so that you know how to plan your turn. It didn’t see much play other than in those decks with the Oracle.

Starlight Crusade Funding: This was straight up bad. There weren’t any decks that made use of that many double events to justify having this in there too. Only those super combo-y decks that in the end failed badly ran this.

Raymond Flint: This guy is my all-time favourite Android universe character. Unfortunately, he is not that good in the Netrunner game. Well, he is ok, but as already mentioned, deck space is always so tight that you can’t just have fancy cards that MIGHT work.

So that was it for the Spin Cycle. Now you know what to expect when the 2 sets (Genesis and Spin) cycle out!

I hope you enjoyed reading these articles as much as I enjoyed writing them and please remember that all of the things I’ve written here are just opinions. So feel free to comment, but be kind. Comments like “the author is being salty” are just silly. Once again, noone forced you to be here.

Thank you so much once again for being with me on this journey through the two sets that will cycle out and I hope to see you all at the upcoming nationals season as I already mentioned in my previous article!

~I hope to see you all at the German (probably), Belgian, Dutch and French nationals (if you are going)!~